yes! after a few days of searching and trying out different travel blog sites, i finally decided to plant myself onto this one! it's a fairly new site i guess and still in work-in-progress (as mentioned at the bottom of this page) but it looks good so far!

anyway, i really don't know how often i'll be blogging but hopefully often enough to keep my friends and family updated on what'd happened to me and where i'll be heading... cos honestly, i don't really know... i mean there's plans worked out and all but life doesn't always goes as planned does it? after all, the real fun in travelling is the unexpected surprises that comes with it... that's what i think, at least! as long as i get through it fine that is! so... i'll be writing about these experiences over the next 3 months... hopefully it'll be fun, exciting, and full of wonderful surprises (fingers crossed!).

I absolutely love this city and would love to live here one day. One of my favorite parts about Barcelona is it's artistic graffiti scene. I came across this wall a few days ago with François.

I was going through my camera today and came across my mate Pete. He was a cool guy and we parted ways several days ago. Hopefully we should be in Amsterdam the same week though.

I've also been getting quite a few questions and emails about the mansion I'm living in. It's a huge villa located a short train ride from the city center in a suburb of Barcelona called Montmeló.

Here's the back yard of the place. The hairy Englishman you see in the picture is my mate, Greg. He is one of the owners of the house and is a cool guy. He's one of those people who has a thousand stories to share.

*edit: I have a feeling that Greg and I are going to be friends for years to come. I know we'll be parting soon, but I'll come across him again one day.**

Today has been a lot of fun. I met these two Canadian girls a couple days ago and we've been hanging out all day. We went for a swim in the pool and then took a walk around Park Güell.

It's a famous park in Spain, but I don't want to bore you so I'll spare the details. We took the metro to the beach and chilled there and just watched people for a couple hours. We came home around 8:30p because all of Paul's and Thijs's old school mates came to visit for a few nights and Greg, the house chef, cooked us a paella feast to celebrate. This weekend will be an interesting one. Not only are there a bunch of crazy dutch guys running around, but Greg's mates from Manchester will be arriving soon too. And to top it all off, Sunday is the final match of the UEFA Euro; Spain vs. Germany. Luckily both England and Holland have already been eliminated or it would be a blood bath in the house. The last few games when Spain progressed through the quarter and semi finals Barcelona has turned completely chaotic. Whenever a goal is scored the entire city erupts with fireworks and cheers of joy. I'm looking forward to seeing the game from the city center.

Here are my Canadian friends. Melissa (left) and Tammy (right). When we got back from the beach all of the Dutch guys were passed out all over the house so they decided to stir one of them from his slumber. He was very surprised to say the least.

By the way, I love this picture. The yellow stuff on the ground are flower petals that fell from the trees. The trees were in full bloom and the entire city was covered in these yellow flower petals.

When I got back that night we had a video in honor of me. It was fun and here are a couple memorable photos. On the left you'll see an egg dripping from my face, it's pretty self explanatory. Then on the right you see Paul, myself, Carly, and Paulina.

Unfortunately my time in this city has come to an end. I woke up early Tuesday morning and caught the train to Barcelona Sants to catch the bus to the city of Reus, where my flight was. At the bus terminal a goofy short man started speaking to me in Spanish.

Now this was a challenge because I speak a very broken Spanish. Meaning I can somewhat understand and somewhat communicate with him. I usually just pick out key nouns and verbs and piece them together into one sentence and hope for the best. And to speak the language is another thing. For example when you go to a restaurant you say, "I would like a water and the paella." When I speak it though it sounds like this, "I want water and paella." But I always seem to be excited when speaking Spanish so it comes out as, "I WANT WATER AND PAELLA!........please." All in Spanish of course.

Anyways the man told me that I had missed the bus to Reus. I was freaking out because the next bus wasn't until 4:00p, several hours after my flight. Then he offered to take me in his taxi to Reus... By then I knew something was up so I told him to go away. He was trying to trick me into a nice €70 ride. Well low and behold when the bus finally showed up I was able to relax and all the anxiety of travel disappeared. I awoke to the sudden stopping of the bus and I was in hell... The Reus airport. It was very small and seemed nice. When I stepped through the front door I was greeted by a frenzy of Scottish, Irish, and German tourists. It was sooo incredibly loud and there were too many accents for one room. I stood in a long line to check my bags. Well as it turns out my bag was 2 kgs over the limit so I crammed some stuff into my carry on and then had to file back into the end of the line and made my way back to the front. I guess I didn't realize how much a kilo was because I was still over by one when they weighed my bag again. I tried to take some more stuff but they said I had to pay for it because they didn't have enough time... It was already 12:15 by this point and my flight departed at 12:30. So I had to go to another desk and pay €15 and then file back into line again. Well I made it to the terminal and the plane hadn't even arrived yet. I noticed the sign on the wall for Ryanair. The banner read Ryanair: The on time airline. It was 12:20 ten minutes until departure when the plane arrived. I thought the banner was ironic but somehow we were in the air at 12:31. And not only were we on time, but I think they made everyone with small children and babies sit in the back of the plane! That was the best part about it. However it was like all the crying children were eerily in sync with one another.

Well when I landed my cousin Lara picked me up at the airport and now I'm sitting on her couch writing this blog. Lara and Kevin have a cool little apartment in Queidersbach, Germany. Let me tell you, this is wine country. The hour long ride from the airport was very scenic and had rolling hills as far as the eye can see that were covered with vineyards. I'm really looking forward to my time here. Sometime soon is Chicken Fest. I can't remember the German name for the festival but you basically walk around, drink beer, and eat fried chicken. That's all I have for now from Germany.

I visited my friend who is in Munich 3 years ago. I also visited some cities of Europe . I like that traveling, so i am going to visit Europe next year again . I like Europe and Munich beer, even some German don't speak English or Chinese.:P

My first Europe trip blog is about The Toy's Museum on Munich pizza. Well, i'd never known there is a Toy's Museum before i've been there. As i know, most of museums are about art or histoy stories.

This museum is very small, the building looks like a lighthouse.If you dont read the sign you might miss it to visit.

The conservator is middleaged woman.she is very kind and she always has smiling on her face. When she saw me,she asked me if I was a student. I said no.....Its very entertaining, each time when i visited museums or some place where need to buy tickets, they always ask me if i am a student, even when i am in China! well, I really hope i am still a student , then i can save my money.... BUT I AM NOT!!.:p

I've had enough of embassies and consulates. Yesterday I drove to Edinburgh, running rather late for my visa appointment, and the lorry driver in front of me once I'd hit the city traffic was blasting out Europe's "The Final Countdown" as we crawled through the West End. Very amusing and poignant I thought... until I got to the visa place (nearly on time) and they told me I could pick up the passports in 3 to 5 working days i.e. 1 to 3 working days after we leave the country. You used to be able to get your visa in one day, until they outsourced it.

Well, I have a couple weeks before I leave, so I thought I would give you the itinerary to help you follow along a bit easier. So, without further adu, The Itinerary- directly coppied and pasted from the EF site :

Itinerary Day 1 - Fly overnight to England

Day 2 - London Arrive in LondonTake a walking tour of London •The Strand•Trafalgar Square •Leicester Square•Covent Garden

I have been travel many of countries.Asian and Europe too .also i get some experience with diferent cultures and peoples too.i would like to shere with that all my memories with you...Thankssumith Dias